Abortion pills would be available at college campuses under California bill

Should California colleges make medication that induces an abortion available to students?

A controversial bill that would require student health centers at the University of California and California State University to offer “non-surgical abortion services” faces a crucial vote today to keep advancing this session. Introduced last February, Senate Bill 320 must pass the Senate Education Committee, which meets at 9 a.m. in Room 4203 of the Capitol, before a Friday deadline for holdover legislation.

Sen. Connie Leyva, a Chino Democrat who is carrying the measure, said she believes the more than 400,000 female students attending UC and CSU deserve affordable and safe abortion procedures on campus. Women who are less than 10 weeks pregnant can obtain the medication, a two-pill dosage of mifepristone and misoprostol, from a doctor, creating a response similar to an early miscarriage.

Students currently have to leave campus to access reproductive health services, sometimes traveling for hours and missing school and work, Leyva notes. Half of all students across both systems come from low-income families, according to a UC San Francisco report, creating further cost barriers. …

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California universities weigh first tuition hikes in 6 years

As reported by the Washington Times:

Faced with record high enrollment and the need to hire faculty, the University of California and California State University systems are considering raising tuition for the first time in six years.

The proposed annual hikes – $270 at the 23 Cal State schools and $280 at UC’s 10 campuses – are being discussed this week by the governing boards of both systems at separate meetings on budget plans.

Leaders of both institutions say they need more funding to maintain the quality of the nation’s largest public university system.

Rates have remained frozen despite declining state support, officials said. The current in-state undergraduate tuition at Cal State schools is $5,400 a year and $12,300 a year at UCs. …

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California State University faculty protest, threaten to strike

As reported by the The Sun:

Faculty from throughout the state protested Tuesday at the Cal State University chancellor’s office in Long Beach, threatening to strike after locking horns with administrators over pay.

The California Faculty Association voted in October to authorize a strike should an agreement not be reached. The union is demanding a 5 percent salary increase for 2015-16, while management for the 23-campus system has offered a 2 percent pay raise — the same increase authorized for all other CSU employee groups.

Tuesday’s protest was timed to coincide with the Board of Trustees meeting in Long Beach. …

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Cal State faculty begins strike vote

As reported by the Press-Enterprise:

California State University faculty members began voting Monday, Oct. 19, on whether to authorize their union to call a strike.

The faculty association, which represents about 25,000 professors, lecturers, librarians, counselors and coaches, and the CSU — the nation’s largest university system with 460,000 students — have been negotiating since May.

If the strike action is authorized, a walkout could take place as soon as January, union officials said.

CSU officials and the faculty organization have already declared …

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CSU Hikes Fees to Offset Freeze on Tuition

1024px-Admin_Building,_California_State_University,_ChicoWhat a difference five years makes.

In 2010, the California State University system issued $352 million in revenue bondsEarlier this month, it issued $1.1 billion of the same thing. The debt issuance is standard, generally considered to be part of the process to keep pace with growth. And financial disclosures are rich with information; people can go to prison for lying on these things.

Comparing the two issuances is a tour of the massive growth of the education industrial complex, a waltz through the luxury world of public, higher education.

Sky-rocketing revenues

According to the bond filings, gross revenues in the system more than doubled in the last 10 years, from $608.7 million in 2005 to $1.57 billion in 2014. The increases were generated across the board, in fees from parking to health facilities to the student union, and from continuing education to housing.

The revenue has started flowing from places other than tuition, which has remained the same since 2011 after increasing 60 percent for full-time undergrad students between 2005 and 2009 to $4,026.

Those increases incensed students, and protests forced bureaucrats to pay attention. Proposition 30, passed by voters in 2012,increased personal income tax on people making over $250,000 to fund education as well. That increase is scheduled to end in 2019.

In the meantime, though, schools have figured out other ways into the wallets of students, thus the increased fees.

Cost of an education

A student in 2010 paid $6,427 to live on-campus, support the student union and use the health facility. The same package today costs $7,958, or 23 percent more.

Students are trying to adjust. Some are living off-campus, which has become a cheaper alternative to the dorm.

Fees aren’t the only way the system has made money. While state funding has waxed and waned, the system increased private fundraising and government grant proceeds, from $1.2 billion in 2005 to $2.1 billion in 2014. The system notes that “amounts shown are not included as part of the gross revenues and generally are restricted to specified uses.”

Growth in the number of staff has sharply outpaced increases in the number of students they serve, with growth among administrators and faculty roughly triple that of students.

Between 2010 and 2015 the number of administrators and faculty grew from 47,000 to 57,000  – or 21 percent – while rank-and-file employees increased from 47,000 to 60,000, or 27 percent. Student enrollment increased from 433,000 to 466,000, or 7 percent.

In the last decade, the system saw two years of year-over-year declines in the number of full-time equivalent students.

Accepted students aren’t dropping everything and enrolling today; in 2010, 36 percent of those accepted enrolled; in 2014 that figure dropped to 27 percent.

With the continued flow of revenue, the system’s financial obligations have jumped 22 percent to over $5 billion from $4.1 billionin 2010.

And the budget? A 26 percent increase to a $8.7 billion budget from $6.9 billion in 2010.

Lottery revenue

The system also receives state lottery revenue: $42 million in 2014, up to $49 million this year. Cal State trustees have allocated part of that to the so-called Early Start program at the state Department of Developmental Services.

A portion of the lottery proceeds also goes toward the retirement fund for system employees. The system combined lottery and other funds to send $493 million to the pension system in 2014, up from $400 million in 2010.

And just last month, a new round of raises for executives was announced.

Originally published by CalWatchdog.com